County Gives Mt. Helix Cross to Private Group : Ruling: Supervisors transfer the landmark to Historical Society to avoid judge’s razing order.

Facing a March 3 deadline to raze the Mt. Helix cross, the County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously Tuesday to preserve the La Mesa landmark by transferring it to private hands.

The 36-foot cross and a circular plot of land on which it stands were given to the nonprofit San Diego Historical Society, which will maintain the hilltop edifice with about $5,000 a year in private funds that it plans to raise.

After a short hearing, the supervisors made clear that they were reluctantly transferring title to the 67-year-old cross to comply with a federal judge’s December ruling that the monument and the Mt. Soledad cross in San Diego must come down.

“I don’t think the controversy that has arisen is worth the money or the effort that has been put into it,” Supervisor Susan Golding said.

In a precedent-setting decision, U.S. District Judge Gordon Thompson Jr. ruled Dec. 3 that the crosses, both in public parks, must be toppled by Tuesday because they violate the state Constitution’s ban on mixing church and state. Thompson also ordered the city of La Mesa to alter its official insignia, which features a depiction of the Mt. Helix cross.

The ruling sparked public reaction, which had not subsided by Tuesday, when nearly a dozen people urged the county to preserve the cross, many citing its historical significance and its prominence as a community landmark. The cross and surrounding park attracted more than 100,00 visitors last year.

The county should “do whatever is necessary to keep the Mt. Soledad and Mt. Helix crosses on public property,” Beverly Clark told the supervisors, urging that they continue legal appeals of Thompson’s decision.

Bonnie Kibbee, a candidate to succeed retiring 2nd District Supervisor George Bailey, testified that those who would have the crosses come down “should buy a one-way ticket to Communist China, a country that shares their values.”

Unlike the city of San Diego, which voted Monday to buy time on the transfer of the Mt. Soledad cross by authorizing the sale but not implementing it, the county actually gave up the cross Tuesday.

Shortly after the supervisors’ vote, documents were recorded transferring the monument and a 30-foot diameter parcel beneath it to the historical society, county spokesman Bob Lerner said.

The surrounding amphitheater, donated to the county in 1929, will remain county property. Easter services, sponsored by the Rotary Club, will continue to be held there, Lerner said. Any stay of Thompson’s order by a higher court would be moot, Lerner said.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals refused to overturn the Thompson’s order, but all 11 members of the court have agreed to take up the issue. The court did not say when it would hear the issue.

To accomplish the transfer, the county declared the cross and land beneath it “surplus real property,” which can be conveyed to a historical society if they are of “general historical interest,” according to laws cited in a report to the supervisors.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which challenged the Mt. Helix cross, strongly disagreed with that interpretation in a Feb. 21 letter to the supervisors that cited numerous reasons why the transfer is not legal.

The ACLU contends that the state Constitution “prohibits the transfer of any property in aid of any religion” and “prohibits the Board of Supervisors from making a gift of any public asset.”

According to the grant deed, if the presence of the cross is ruled illegal after its transfer to the historical society, diminishing its historic value, the property would immediately revert to the county, which would be responsible for removing it.